David and Goliath: did it really happen?
Giant slaying is part and parcel of folklore, whether it’s Jack and beanstalk, or Ulysses and the Cyclops. Giants, representing evil, are part of our shared cultural memory; they are to be feared and slaughtered, like dragons, werewolves and other mythological creatures that personify wickedness. They are the fearful spectres of a childish imagination and the immature fears of people who have not yet come of age. They are by definition myth, mere fantastic creatures of imagined darkness.
With this in mind, the biblical story of the young hero David striking down the great ugly giant, Goliath, with a slingshot, and then using the giant’s own massive sword to cut off his head, is seen as yet another fairy tale from the nursery room bookshelf. Myth, magic, heroism, and all such fantasy is something we learn to reject when we grow up. With stories like this, the Bible is relegated to the world of make-belief, for those who have not yet learned to be rational. Such ‘believers’ should be pitied or despised for their intellectual childishness and crass gullibility.
But hold on, this is all a terrible miscomprehension of the true Bible story. For a start, Goliath was not a giant in the mythical sense at all. In reality he was big, but not that big. Sure, he would have earned an entry in the Guinness Book of Records, but not by much. Goliath was not that tall! In fact he was not quite 10 foot, and the tallest verifiable entry in the Guinness Book of Records reached almost 9 foot. Such a height is theoretically possible, particularly as the Bible tells us that Goliath came from a race of very large people that have now died out. The fossil record shows examples of many animals that were far larger than their modern counterparts, so, in theory at least a 10 foot man is a distinct possibility.
However, even when this is accepted, the story of David’s defeat of Goliath is still often called a legend. In their A History of Ancient Israel and Judah, J. Maxwell Miller and John H. Hayes wrote: “Folk themes, such as the lad killing the giant with a sling stone . . . remind us that we are dealing with largely legendary materials” But surely this is jumping to conclusions. What we have in reality is simply a large warrior being cut down by the normal weapon of a shepherd boy, a weapon with which he was well-practised at using against bears and wolves. Does that make it legend? Surely not!
The story, related in 1 Samuel, chapter 17, is that Goliath of Gath, a hero of the Philistine army, challenged the Israelite army to provide a man to fight him. Despite Goliath's vast size and his armour consisting of a bronze helmet, bronze mail armour weighing 5000 shekels (80kg) and a shield, David was able to kill him with single stone directed at his forehead.
The David of this story was a shepherd and skilful minstrel, and by the time of this event he was a musician at the court of Saul, the first king of Israel. Following this triumph, Saul took David on as commander of his troops. David was the son of Jesse, a farmer of Bethlehem, and eventually became the first king to rule a united Israel. According to the genealogies given in Matthew and Luke, this David was an ancestor of Jesus Christ.
The questions we need to ask is, were David and Goliath real people, or is this story merely a myth written centuries after it was supposed to have occurred, as some scholars claim? Is there any evidence outside of Scripture that this event could really have happened? Is this story truth, or is it fairytale?
What we will now explore are some archaeological discoveries in Israel, which provide evidence that is consistent with the biblical narrative.
David: Did he exist?
Despite the accounts of David's life and exploits as recorded in the Bible, many scholars have doubted that King David actually existed.
However, it is worth considering some fascinating and tantalising archaeological remains that do indicate that David was a real figure of history. Throughout the kingdom period of the history of Israel, the kings of Judah were buried within the city of David. At the southern end of the City of David, south of the Old City of Jerusalem, there are two tunnel tombs which many scholars believe are the tombs of David and Solomon. Unfortunately, they were damaged by later quarrying, so no identifying inscriptions have survived. In the same area are many Iron Age tombs, possibly those of other kings of Judah.
Dhiban(Jordan) with ancient Dibon in the foreground, looking south.
In 1868 an inscribed stone, dating from the 9th century BC - known as the Moabite Stone or the Mesha Stela - was discovered at Dibon in Jordan, by F.A. Klein, a German missionary. Dibon was an ancient city east of the Dead Sea. The stone, rounded at the top, was 1.1 metres high and 0.6 metres in breadth. It consisted of thirty-four lines, written in the ancient Hebrew alphabet and was set up by Mesha at Dan as a record and memorial of his victories.
Unfortunately, the stone was much fragmented, but in 1993 a French scholar, Andre Lemaire, spent seven years piecing it all together. When he did so he discovered the words 'House of David'. Line 31 of the Moabite Stone contains the words '...the sheep of the land. And the house of David dwelt in Horonen'. This was reported in Biblical Archaeology Review, May-June, 1994. and created such a sensation that it was also reported on the front page of The New York Times. This inscription showed that Israel and Judah were important kingdoms in the 9th Century BC, and refuted the views of those scholars who claimed that these were never nations of any significance, and even disputed that David had ever been at the head of a united monarchy.
A report in Biblical Archaeology Review (March-April, 1994) states:
Avraham Biran and his team of archaeologists found a remarkable inscription from the 9th Century (BC) that refers to the 'House of David' and to the 'King of Israel'. This is the first time that the name David has been found in any inscription outside the Bible. That the inscription refers not simply to David but to the 'House of David', the dynasty of the great Israelite king, is even more remarkable.
Tel Dan inscription: 850-835 BC
As well as this inscription, there is another, c. 945 BC, by the Egyptian pharoah Shoshenq I, which mentions "the highlands of David."
Of course there are various interpretations regarding these archaeological finds among scholars, but many do feel they indicate the historic reality of the biblical figure, king David.
The Philistines
We know that a race called the Philistines actually existed. The Philistines were a people who, from the 12th century BC, occupied the coastal lowlands of Palestine. They were organised under five lords who ruled at the five chief Philistine cities: Gaza, Ashdod, Askalon, Gath and Ekron. Gath, the home of Goliath, was situated on the frontiers of Judah and, nowadays is identified with Tell-es-Safi, where crusaders built the castle of Blanche Garde.
The Philistines are believed to have invaded Israel in the 11th century BC. They were highly civilised, skilled in agriculture and commerce and had their own culture and language. Apart from this, not much is known about their language and writing. Furthermore, the Philistines were technologically advanced and possessed iron weaponry, this being much harder and more durable than bronze and copper, used by the more primitive Israelites.
Archaeological Findings at Tell-es-Safi
Tell-es-Safi (known as Tel Tsafit in Hebrew) is a mound, some 100 acres in size, which occupies a commanding position on the border between the Judean foothills (known as the Shephelah) and the coastal plain; approximately halfway between Jerusalem and Ashkelon. It was continuously inhabited from the 4th millennium BC until 1948 AD and, nowadays, is one of the largest and most important pre-Classical period archaeological sites in Israel.
Professor Aren Maeir, head of the archaeology department at Bar-Ilan University near Tel Aviv in Israel, was director of the dig of the mound widely believed to be the site of the ancient city of Gath, which, according to the Bible, was the place where Goliath lived.
During the excavation at the site, Maeir found a shard (a broken piece of pottery) containing an inscription in early Semitic style spelling with the name of Goliath. According to Maeir, this is “the first archaeological evidence suggesting the biblical story of David slaying the Philistine giant actually took place … This is a groundbreaking find. Here we have very nice evidence of the name Goliath appearing in the Bible in the context of the story of David and Goliath is not some later literary creation.” This finding at Tell-es-Safi indicates that 'Goliath' was a name used in this area at the time David was supposed to have fought him.
In conclusion
When all this data is put together we could not say that it proved the existence of either David or Goliath, let alone that they ever met in one-to-one combat. However, there is evidence here that is consistent with such a belief. ‘Goliath’ was a name used at that time among the Philistines. Furthermore, various archaeological discoveries do indicate that David was a real person in history. What we must bare in mind when evaluating this evidence is what expectations we ought to have. It would be wrong and unfair to expect archaeological investigations uncovering a period some 3,000 years ago to be much more certain than what we have here. We must judge the biblical narrative with the same standards we would judge other history of the time. Seen in that light, the external evidence for biblical accuracy of the account of David and Goliath is very good. After all, in Britain we have very little real evidence or data about the names and existence of Iron Age British kings who lived 3,000 years ago. In comparison to this benchmark, what we know about King David from archaeology is very significant indeed.